Saturday, January 18, 2014

Republicans in politics profess love for the winnowing of the market, for the market's hand in small business entrepreneurship. I wonder why they are so bad at it.

Reminiscent of Tony and Bridget Sutton, Baja Sol, the Nienow spouses now are reported to have run their ship aground.

Hat tip to Bluestem Prairie, linking here, from this post (with its trenchant State Senate website quote). Talk about fated love. Love of that which one is not good at. On the other hand, Bill Cooper and Harold Hamilton are successful Republicans operating their respective business ventures. I hold the utmost respect for Hamilton's Micro Control business acumen; his having been in business successfully, in Fridley, for years.

UPDATE: Nienow in the recent past professed deep understanding in financing business enterprise; e.g., here, here and here, regarding a billion dollar venture, one dwarfing his less-than-a-million debt difficulty. He was a vocal racino-at-Cantebury advocate. At the time Sutton opposed gambling expansion in Minnesota. There was a story, but I do not recall detail ...

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photo from here (Nienow standing)

Voting record for Nienow; here and here (with ratings). He was a voter ID (voter disenfranchisement) supporter.

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There is not Schadenfreude in somebody's business failing. But one question lingers. Was it a sound business investment for SBA money, especially to the tune of half a million, or was politics a factor in the Nienow spouses getting that half a million lent to them? Perhaps such a speculative and subjective question may be answered in litigation.

Of interest to Ramsey readers; the Bluestem Prairie post on the Nienow loan default/lawsuit by federal authorities also noted:

Nienow and the National Camp Association, Inc, a Minnesota corporation, was also sued in state court by the National Camp Association, Inc, a New York Corporation (Minnesota Case No. 30-CV-11-1022, filed December 6, 2011). [...]

In the state case, the National Camp Association Inc, a New York Corporation, claimed that Nienow had purchased the assets of the New York organization but had not made full payment. Online records indicate that the court granted a summary judgement on June 6, 2013, on the original principle of $30,000.00. On December 24, 2013, the court a gave a judgement to the plaintiff on the original priniciple of $7,755.04.

That is unclear and a search of court records: judgments, did not list anything under Sean Nienow's name.

Here is the main part of the online docket, civil filings, for that case:

click thumbnail to read
Note that Kristi Weikel represented the plaintiff, Weikel being a Ramsey lawyer officed in Jim Deal's Town Center office building. The image shows judgment entry; so it is unclear why a search of the Minnesota Court's case search site:judgments yielded nothing.

Pawlenty landed into bed with the banks; presumably under lucrative terms for Timmy. Bless his soul. If any reader knows of any very friendly bank legislation passed during Pawlenty's legislative leadership time, or signed into law during his time as governor, please leave a comment or send an email giving detail.

Where will Nienow land, and would he have been sued on an SBA loan default were it to have happened during Bushco years; with the U.S. Attorney then Ms. Paulose, who among other things reportedly got crosswise with Norm and almost all the lawyers having to report to her, to the point the Bush-Gonzales Justice Department pulled the plug on her and reassigned her to DC duty? With a Monica Gooding good Christian litmus test as a key arrow in the Paulose quiver, Nienow might have had common ground with the then U.S. Attorney, and fared better. It is speculative. What is fact, now the Nienows and their unsteady business effort have run into the shoals.

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Nienow is mentioned in online LTE items, here; which includes other letters proving all politics is local. And that one item/letter stating:

After attending the past two budget workshops it has become apparent that the “robbing Peter to pay Paul” intergovernmental money transfers have come back to haunt you. This is evidenced by the $1.7 million Park Board loan payback dilemma, the lack of road maintenance funds due to the draining of MSA and TIF accounts on overspent projects and the increase in debt service by $241,000.

And it's all on the street where we live.

(As an aside for those interested in word usage, "politics" is it a singular or plural noun? If meaning a bundle of processes and procedures, that seems to have a plural reach but "bundle" is singular; where if "politics" refers to a process among people in civil society, process also is singular. So is the phrase all politics are local, or all politics is local. I used the latter, above).

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Nienow mentioned here, as a voucher proponent, back when his party controlled the Minnesota Senate but Dayton contrlled the veto pen. Days of yore, hope being we never see that party controlling either house, for a long long time while they navel gaze and/or do their circular firing squad thing, among factions.